In Colossians 2:14 it says, “[God] canceled the debt, which listed all the rules we failed to follow. He took away that record with its rules and nailed it to the cross.” (NCV)
I mess up from time to time. I’m not alone, we all make mistakes! However I don’t have to live with guilt, because the Bible says, “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1 NIV). But I do have to live with my mistakes.
The Bible never hides this truth. It is painfully honest about the failures of its heroes. God saved the world from flood through a man named Noah—who then got drunk and naked and ruined it all. Moses led the children of Israel through the Red Sea and into freedom—yet his anger kept him out of the Promised Land. King David was a man after God’s heart—but he also had an affair and murdered the woman’s husband so he wouldn’t be discovered.
God realizes my frailty. If he only used perfect people, the Bible would be a pretty short book! But God does not leave me alone in my sin. He has a solution for my failures: grace.
The Bible says, “[God] canceled the debt, which listed all the rules we failed to follow. He took away that record with its rules and nailed it to the cross” (Colossians 2:14 NCV).
In fact, when I look at all those failures in the Bible, I get a clear picture. I can be amazed at how God used those people to accomplish his purposes in big ways. But what is most encouraging is that he used them in spite of their failures and mistakes.
Just like those heroes of the Bible, I am a trophy of God’s grace.
My primary witness to the world around me is not all the great things I do for God. My most important witness will be how I handle mistakes I’ve made. Will I mope about your failures, or do I revel in the grace of God?
People want to meet a God who turns failures into triumphs. They want to know a God who can transform the lives of broken people.
The amazing part of God’s grace isn’t just his power to forgive. It’s also the strength and renewal he gives us when I choose to start over and trust in him to help me keep going.
He destroyed the record of the debt I owed, with its requirements that worked against me. He canceled it by nailing it to the cross.
The record that was canceled contained the legal demands of the OT Law. The law that opposed us by its demands for payment for my sin. No one can be saved by merely keeping that record, the moral truths and principles in the OT still teach and guide today.
I can enjoy a new life in Christ because I have joined him in his death and resurrection. My evil desires, bondage to sin, and love of sin died with him. Now, joining him in his resurrection life, I may have unbroken fellowship with God and freedom from my sin. My debt for sin has been paid in full; my sins are swept away and forgotten by God; and I can be clean and new.
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